Bird spit coffee from Malaysia?

Prized in China for is alleged health benefits for hundreds of years, nests made from swiftlets' saliva are being mixed into coffee and cereal as the Southeast Asian producers of the delicacy seek to broaden its appeal, and their profit margins.

The nests are among the world's most expensive foods, selling for up to US$2,500 (S$3,400) a kg and the swiftlets that weave them are indigenous to Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.

China consumes almost 90 per cent of all Bird Saliva Soups, traditionally eaten in soup, creating an industry that last year recorded US$5 billion in sales and which executives expect to double by 2020.

Companies such as Malaysia's Swiftlet Eco Park, one of the country's largest developers of swiftlet houses, want bigger gains by expanding their product line and market beyond China, where importers can often dictate the price.

Bird spit coffee from Malaysia?

"Ask anybody in the industry where is your market and they'll say China and Hong Kong. Everybody is going there," said Group Managing Director Loke Yeu Loong. "We are looking at new markets, but if I sell raw Bird Saliva Soup to Europe or India, they don't even know how to cook it."

Swiftlet Eco makes coffee, skin care, puddings and candies with Bird Saliva Soup. Loke declined to give specific sales figures but said the profit margin on some of these products was 10 times more than the raw nests.

The company is also spending big on marketing Bird Saliva Soup as a health food in the Middle East, Europe and the United States and plans to raise about $30 million through an initial public offering and New York listing in the third quarter of this year.

Southeast Asian swiftlets' nests are particularly popular in the Lunar New Year festivities, which began in China last week, and are believed to be rich in nutrients that can help digestion, raise libido and improve the immune system.

Malaysia is the world's largest producer of raw nests after Indonesia.

Lee Kong Heng, president of the Malaysian Federation of Bird Saliva Soup Traders Association, says marketing Bird Saliva Soup as a supplement would attract younger, wealthier and more health-conscious consumers worldwide.

Vietnam's largest birds' nest producer Yen Viet Joint Stock Co. is also keen to play up the benefits of the delicacy. The company makes cereals and porridge and is investing into scientific research in a bid to increase global sales, said Chief Executive Dang Pham Minh Loan.

Malaysian Bird Saliva Soup producers are well placed to market to the majority Muslim Middle East because the nests are halal, or a food permissible under Islam, Swiftlet Eco Park's Loke said.

With more research, he hopes Bird Saliva Soup will become a global phenomenon. "We can conduct research and prove the benefit of consuming Bird Saliva Soup scientifically," he said.

About Bird Saliva Soup Soup

Bird Saliva Soup soup is a soup made from the nest of a kind of cave'dwelling swift. It is regarded as a delicacy, health booster, life prolonger and aphrodisiac in Asia, particularly in China and Hong Kong, and is said rejuvenate skin, clear up complexions, clean out the digestive track, and cure lung cancer. 

Bird Saliva Soup Soup

The translucent, gelatinous material used to make the Bird Saliva Soup gives the soup richness and texture and was compared by an 18th century adventurer with the foam of wave crests. Chinese have made the nest material into a jelly mixed with spices or sweets as well as soup. The taste? One producer said, it was “sort of like a piece of paper." The nest material has little flavor and generally is cooked with something else to be give it flavor.

Bird Saliva Soup soup was invented around 1750 by a Siam-based Chinese man named Hao Yieng who discovered the "wind-eating" swiflets and learned that their nests were soluble in water. In 1770, the King of Siam, granted Hao Yieng a monopoly on the Bird Saliva Soup trade. He promptly became rich. Later the Siamese took back control of the nests and a "corps of hereditary collectors" was established.
A kilogram of top quality Bird Saliva Soups can go for $3,000 to $4,000, half the price of gold, and is the product of about 120 nests. A tureen of soup for four people of "Nest of Sea Swallows with Venomous Snake and Chrysanthemum Petals with Lemon grass Lotus Seeds in Soup"---with several drops of venom squeezed from the glands of a snake that pulled out a bag---can go for $100 or more in Hong Kong and is made from six nests.

Bird Saliva Soup Swiftlets

The nests used for the soup are made by three bird species: 1) the edible-nest or white-nest swiftlet; 2) Germain's swiftlet; and 3) the black-nest swiftlet. These birds live primarily in large limestone caves on islands or near the sea in Southeast Asia. Sometimes called "sea swallows," the small swifts feed on flying insects and navigate through caves like bats using echolocation.
Both males and females participate in nest building. The sticky gelatinous noodle-like fibers used to make the nests are secreted by well-developed salivary glands in their mouth The glands enlarge during the breeding season. When the fibers harden they produce a glue that hold the nest together and keeps it attached to the cave. The incubation period for the eggs is 19 to 23 days. Young remain in the nest for an additional six to eight weeks.
The best nest come from swiftlets that live deep inside caves. These birds echoloccate with a series of high pitched clicks and rattles that increase in frequency from five a second in open spaces to twenty a second near walls. Distance is determined by amount of time it takes the sounds to bounce off the wall and return to the ear. Direction is determined by the minute difference between the time sound reaches each ear. The system is effective but crude compared to echolocation system of bats.